She's Got the Bronze
by GallifreyanVampireSlayer
Summary: The TARDIS sends Amy and the Doctor back in time for a most important event.


Title: She's Got the Bronze

Show: Doctor Who

Characters: 11th Doctor, Rose Tyler, Amy Pond

Rating: K

Summary: The TARDIS sends Amy and the Doctor back in time.

Groggily rolling out of bed, Amy Pond stifled a yawn. She grimaced as she stiffly approached her overflowing closet, her muscles aching from the previous days' adventure. She and the Doctor had foiled an assassination plot, which had required an awful lot of running. After carefully selecting clothes for the day, she quickly got dressed and then made her way to the galley, where the Doctor was waiting for her, breakfast already made. As she wolfed down blueberry pancakes, her favorite, he proposed a plan for the day.

"How would you feel about playing a game?"

"Sounds good," She answered after downing a cup of tea, made with precisely the right amount of sugar. "What's the game?"

"It's just something an old companion of mine invented, where we set the TARDIS to random and see where we end up, see what's important there." He told her.

"Well, let's do it, then!" Amy exclaimed, taking one last bite of pancake and then carrying her plate over to the sink.

She followed the Doctor to the console room and watched as he excitedly dashed around, pressing buttons like a madman. Amy was quite used to this behavior.

"All right, old girl, take us where you will!" He shouted, addressing his time-and-space ship lovingly.

The time rotor moved up and down, and the ship shook a little, as the Doctor wasn't the best of drivers. Amy poked her head outside, taking in her surroundings. Looking up at the skyline, she noted its familiarity,

"Hey, I think we're in London!" She announced to her friend, who as straightening up some things that had shifted during the landing.

"What? Are you sure?" He exclaimed, coming to join her at the door.

"Yep, definitely London. Pretty near your time, too." He stated after contemplating their location.

"Think I might run into a younger version of myself on field trip?" Amy asked.

"Probably not. This doesn't seem to be the sightseeing part of town." He remarked, his eyes taking in the lack of squeaky-clean tourist attractions. This wasn't a place to take in a tour. No one would pay to see the graffiti-covered walls. The buildings here weren't for show or decoration, these were peoples roofs-over-their-heads, their place to stay.

Amy nodded, and then ventured over to a rusty park bench, picking up a discarded newspaper.

"It's June the fourth, nineteen ninety-three. Wonder what's so special about today. Gotta be something, right, Doctor?"

When she didn't get a reply from him, she looked up and saw him reading a sign taped to the door of a large brick building across the street. Sidling up beside him, she saw it read:

_Jericho Street Junior School_

_Under-Sevens Gymnastics Team Exhibition-Today_

Noticing that his companion had joined him, the Doctor reached out and took her hand.

"Let's go!" He said, dragging her into the building,

"To a gymnastics show? What for?" She inquired, honestly quite baffled.

"There's something I need to see." Was his answer, whispered as they took their seats on folding chairs set up around a collection of battered gymnastics equipment.

The Doctor didn't notice, as he was engrossed in the performance, but Amy watched him the whole time, trying to figure out what was so important about this moment, why the TARDIS had materialized here. When a young girl with dirty blonde hair came out to do her routine, grinning widely, the Doctor's face changed. His expression was so full of love and pride, with a hint of sadness as well, that Amy knew. Amy knew she was the one they were here for. Just a little girl from a neighborhood that's the not the nicest, doing a few cartwheels. She seemed so ordinary, not remarkable at all. But Amy knew better from the look on the Doctor's face. Whoever she was, or would become, she must have been really important to him, for his ship to take them here to see her instead of some exotic planet. It appeared that this performance was just as significant as the overthrowing of a unjust king, a point in time not to be missed by them.

The Doctor stared intently as this girl did handstands and walked the balance beam. Amy watched him for the remainder of the show, waiting to see if he would react as strongly to any of the other performers, but it seemed to be only her. After each child had done their piece, awards were given out. A woman with a bad perm read names off of a list and those who were called timidly walked up to receive a medal as their parents proudly cheered. The Doctor was on the verge of tears as the beaming blond girl, announced as Rose Tyler, went up to receive her award for third place. No one clapped for her as loud as him, with the exception of a tracksuit-clad woman in the front row, presumably her mum, and an attractive young man in a 1940s military coat standing near the back.

Amy had some familiarity with that name, Rose Tyler. She had been brought by the Doctor a few times, seemingly by accident, and then the subject was abruptly changed. From what she gathered, Rose was a former traveling companion, and she had been with him not too long ago. The catch in his voice when he discussed her and the reverence with which he said her caused Amy to conclude that the Doctor loved her but something had split them apart.

She knew better than to mention these conclusions now. Instead she reached out and gave his hand a squeeze. The Doctor turned to her and gave her a weak smile, leading her out of the gymnasium. On their way out, they passed the handsome man who had been cheering for Rose, and the Doctor gave him a look.

"Do you know him?" Amy whispered.

"Yes, but it's too early in his timeline for him to find me yet." He said.

Amy nodded and took this information in, cataloguing away in her brain yet another mystery of her traveling companion's past. Stepping outside again, the pair walked over to where they parked their police box. Amy knew that they would most likely head to the galley then and sit and have a cuppa, as they often did, and she wondered how much he would be willing to reveal about this girl and just what had happened with her.


End file.
